From Paramount to Prime: The Battle for Theaters in a Streaming Age

By: Brooke Gerber

At this year’s Academy Awards, Sean Baker’s Anora dominated the evening, winning a total of five Oscars – an impressive feat for the independent film.[1] Now that Hollywood’s biggest night has come to a close, Baker’s acceptance speech for Best Director stands out as one of the highlights of the evening, criticizing streaming services for their monopolistic impact on the film industry.

Taking the stage for the third time that night, Baker made a self-proclaimed “battle cry,” pleading for filmmakers to continue making films for the big screen rather than succumbing to the allure of streaming.[2] Audiences have witnessed the cinema experience decline throughout the past decade, especially following the onset of the pandemic. Baker referred to this phenomenon in his speech, highlighting that upward of 1,000 movie screens have shut down in the United States since 2020 – “right now, the theatre-going experience is under threat,”[3] he exclaimed.

But what exactly is threatening movie theaters in 2025? The obvious first place to look is the impact of streaming on in-person viewership. Streaming has taken over the film industry, with dual theatrical and streaming releases becoming a widespread practice in the years following the pandemic.[4]  However, the tangible impact of streaming in the film industry has its roots in an antitrust legal battle that occurred 77 years ago.[5]

The monopolization of the film industry is arguably the most substantial factor to consider in the fall of movie theaters. In the past, movie studios were governed by the Paramount Consent Decrees, established in 1948 in United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc.[6]  United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. was an antitrust suit filed by the Department of Justice in 1938, alleging that eight of the major motion picture companies had been conspiring to control the film industry through their ownership rights and distribution practices.[7] Through owning the entirety of the creative, marketing, and screening processes, these companies possessed total control over a film’s release and its subsequent reach.[8] Functionally, this alleged conspiracy amounted to vertical integration across the film industry.[9] Hearing the case on appeal, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of anti-monopolistic requirements, ordering the divestment of these major studios from their cinemas to ensure more widespread competition.[10]

The Paramount Decrees governed the eight studios implicated in the lawsuit: MGM, Paramount, RKO, 20th Century Fox, Warner Brothers, Universal, United Artists, and Columbia.[11] However, these studios are no longer monopolizing the film industry; rather, we look to companies like Netflix, Disney, and Amazon as the titans controlling the streaming landscape today.[12]

The outdated language and governance within the Paramount Decrees led to their termination by the US District Court for the Southern District of New York in August 2020.[13] At the request of the Department of Justice, the 1948 Supreme Court decision was overturned to bridge the disconnect in standards between the eight studios and the current streaming behemoths.[14]

While the overturning of the Paramount Decrees may work to level the playing field between film studios and streaming services, its implications bode poorly for the trajectory of movie theaters. Films need theaters; in fact, to be eligible for an Academy Award, a film must have a theatrical run of at least seven consecutive days in a commercial motion picture theater.[15] What safeguards exist to prevent major streaming platforms from engaging in block-booking licensing agreements? These such practices could monopolize screens across the country, creating barriers to entry for smaller independent film distributors.[16] Such action would make it increasingly difficult for smaller production companies to get their films on screens across the country, effectively throwing independent art to the wayside. This fear is one sweeping the film industry, as independent companies anticipate the repercussions of vertical integration while the streaming giants fight to commandeer our local screens.

In this era of uncertainty, Baker’s words are a promise that independent films are not going anywhere, despite the continuous rise of the streaming empires: “Watching a film in the theater with an audience is an experience. We can laugh together, cry together, and, in a time in which the world can feel very divided, this is more important than ever.”[17]

Link to image source:

https://pixabay.com/illustrations/cinema-movie-camera-projector-film-4153289/

[1] J. Kim Murphy, Sean Baker Says Movie Theaters Are ‘Under Threat’ While Accepting Oscar for Best Director: ‘Keep Making Films for the Big Screen. I Know I Will’, Variety (Mar. 2, 2025), https://variety.com/2025/film/news/sean-baker-best-director-oscar-anora-1236323071/.

[2] Manohla Dargis, Sean Baker’s Oscars Battle Cry (and Mine): Don’t Abandon the Big Screen, The New York Times (Mar. 3, 2025), https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/03/movies/sean-baker-oscars-speech.html

[3] J. Kim Murphy, Sean Baker Says Movie Theaters Are ‘Under Threat’ While Accepting Oscar for Best Director: ‘Keep Making Films for the Big Screen. I Know I Will’, Variety (Mar. 2, 2025), https://variety.com/2025/film/news/sean-baker-best-director-oscar-anora-1236323071/.

[4] See, e.g., Hannah Shaw-Williams, Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow Lawsuit Against Disney Explained, ScreenRant (July 30, 2021), https://screenrant.com/scarlett-johansson-black-widow-lawsuit-disney-plus-explained/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

[5] United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc., 334 U.S. 131 (1948).

[6] Simone Swersky, Terminations of the Paramount Decrees: A Greenlight for Monopolies, Columbia Undergraduate Law Review (Jan. 9, 2023), https://www.culawreview.org/current-events-2/terminations-of-the-paramount-decrees-a-greenlight-for-monopolies#:~:text=Paramount%20Pictures%2C%20Inc.,took%20measures%20against%20block%20booking.

[7] The Paramount Decrees, U.S. Department of Justice, https://www.justice.gov/atr/paramount-decree-review

[8] G. Vaughn Joy, The Paramount Decrees and the Deregulation of Hollywood Studios, ProMarket (Dec. 12, 2022), https://www.promarket.org/2022/12/12/the-paramount-decrees-and-the-deregulation-of-hollywood-studios/.

[9]  Id.

[10] Id.

[11] Id.

[12] Chris Yogerst, The Long Shadow of Antitrust Targets From Hollywood’s Golden Age, The Hollywood Reporter (Sep. 4, 2023), https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/paramount-decrees-antitrust-hollywood-1235581215/.

[13] G. Vaughn Joy, The Paramount Decrees and the Deregulation of Hollywood Studios, ProMarket (Dec. 12, 2022), https://www.promarket.org/2022/12/12/the-paramount-decrees-and-the-deregulation-of-hollywood-studios/#:~:text=The%20Paramount%20Decrees%20were%20in,the%20request%20of%20the%20DOJ.

[14] Id.

[15] Eligibility, Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, https://www.oscars.org/sites/oscars/files/96_general_entry_rules.pdf

[16] Chris Yogerst, The Long Shadow of Antitrust Targets From Hollywood’s Golden Age, The Hollywood Reporter (Sep. 4, 2023), https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/paramount-decrees-antitrust-hollywood-1235581215/.

[17] J. Kim Murphy, Sean Baker Says Movie Theaters Are ‘Under Threat’ While Accepting Oscar for Best Director: ‘Keep Making Films for the Big Screen. I Know I Will’, Variety (Mar. 2, 2025), https://variety.com/2025/film/news/sean-baker-best-director-oscar-anora-1236323071/.